The Monuments Men

Frederick Hartt
( 1914-1991 )

Professor and renowned scholar of Italian Renaissance art, Frederick
Hartt was born in Boston, Massachusetts on May 22, 1914. He received a
B.A. from Columbia University in 1935 before studying briefly at
Princeton University’s Institute of Advanced Study. He spent the summer
of 1936 in Europe, where he began a lifelong admiration for all things
Italian. In his own words, “I lost my heart to Italy at the time of my
very first visit to that beautiful land.” He then enrolled in the
Institute of Fine Arts at New York University, where he earned an M.A.
in Italian art in 1937. He lectured on art history at Bennett Junior
College in Millbrook, New York from 1939 to 1941, and then worked as an
assistant and cataloguer at the Yale University Art Gallery in New
Haven, Connecticut.

Hartt enlisted in April 1942 and received
his commission in the U.S. Army in July 1943. He arrived in Italy on
January 14, 1944, and was assigned as a photo interpreter with the 90th
Photo Wing Reconnaissance in San Severo. There, he evaluated aerial
photos after bombings to determine the level of collateral damage
sustained by nearby monuments. Hartt was thus confronted with the
destruction of the same works of art and monuments he had fallen in love
with years prior, but was helpless to act. He longed to get out from
behind his desk and actively work to prevent further damages. To this
end, Hartt wrote a letter to Monuments Man Maj. Ernest T. DeWald,
Director of the MFAA, and begged to be transferred to work as a
Monuments Man; DeWald approved his request.

Hartt received
his orders and was transferred to the headquarters of U.S. Fifth Army in
Naples, Italy. In Naples, he joined Monuments Officers Capt. Deane
Keller, Maj. Ernest DeWald, and Lt. Cdr. Perry Cott. Together, the
Monuments Men in Italy were responsible for safeguarding and recovering
some of the world’s most treasured works of art. When the U.S. Army
seized Rome in June 1944, Hartt compiled a damage assessment report of
the city’s most prominent monuments. After the bombing of Florence, he
composed an official report of damages sustained by such notable
Florentine monuments as the Uffizi, the Duomo, the Baptistery, and the
churches of Santa Croce, Santo Spirito, and San Lorenzo. Of the six
Florentine bridges, only one, the Ponte

Vecchio, had been spared by German explosives.

In
early August 1944 Hartt participated in the discovery of hundreds of
works of art from the Florentine public collections, principally the
Uffizi Gallery and the Pitti Palace. The works had been evacuated from
the city for safety safety by Florentine officials, but many prominent
items had been looted by German soldiers. Almost one year would pass
before Keller and Hartt would discover the missing masterpieces in the
Alto Adige region of northern Italy.

In July 1945, in an old
jail in the town of San Leonardo, Keller and Hartt found paintings by
Caravaggio, Rubens, Cranach, and Botticelli. Several days later, works
of art by Donatello, Michelangelo, and Raphael were found in the
carriage house of Castle Neumelans in Campo Tures. Hartt assisted Keller
with preparing the items for shipment home to Florence by rail.
Escorted by a security detachment of sixty military police, the train
pulled into Florence’s Campo di Marti station on July 21st.
The next morning, Hartt and Keller took part in a parade of military
trucks which entered Piazza della Signoria to great applause by
thousands of jubilant Florentines.

Hartt returned to the
United States in 1946 and became a visiting lecturer at Smith College in
Amherst, Massachusetts, where he also served as Acting Director of the
Smith College Art Museum until 1947. After completing his Ph.D. from the
Institute of Fine Arts at NYU in 1949, Hartt went on to have a
distinguished career as a professor at numerous American institutions,
including Washington University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the
University of Virginia. He retired in 1984.

For his wartime
efforts to preserve and recover Italian art, Hartt was awarded the
Bronze Star. As a symbol of their deep appreciation, the Italian
government named him a knight of the Crown of Italy, an honorary citizen
of Florence, and awarded him the Order of Merit of the Italian
Republic. He remained devoted to the preservation of art for the
duration of his life. He served on the board of directors of the
American Committee for the Restoration of Italian Monuments, and was a
member of the Committee to Rescue Italian Art, The Renaissance Society
of America and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Frederick
Hartt died in Washington, D.C. on October 31, 1991. On Friday, March 5,
1993, the city of Florence welcomed the urn containing his ashes for
burial with full honors at the cemetery of the Church of San Miniato al
Monte. In attendance were both of Hartt’s wartime drivers, Franco
Ruggenini and Alessandro Olschki.